Colleen Collins is an award-winning authorwho sold her first book, a romantic comedy, to Harlequin for their (then) Love & Laughter line in 1997. The title was RIGHT CHEST, WRONG NAME, followed by RIGHT CHAPEL, WRONG COUPLE. Since then, she's written 15 more novels for Harlequin's Duets, Temptation, and Flipside lines (as well as a romantic paranormal thriller for Dorchester, writing as Cassandra Collins, titled DARK ANGEL). She's currently writing for Harlequin's Blaze and Signature lines.  Along the way, her books placed first in the Colorado Gold, Romancing the Rockies, and Top of the Peak contests, and placed in the finals for the Holt Medallion, Coeur de Bois Readers Choice, Award of Excellence, More than Magic, and Romance Writers of America RITA contests.

This section should be retitled "How I Became a P.I. and a Writer" because I currently do both. Concerning the writing career, I always wanted to write novels, and in 1989 I finally decided I would write every day until I finished a book. By 1991, I'd finished a novel that was thicker than a phone book, something that will never be published and shouldn't be, but it was a hands-on way to learn about the craft of writing. After that I joined writing organizations, hooked up with some great critique partners, started going to conferences and meeting agents and editors, and by 1996 sold my first novel. As for the P.I. career, it was one of those things that fell my way. I'm sure one of these days I'll end up writing about a saucy P.I. investigator who has a secret writing career...stay tuned...

After being a California girl most of my life, I now live in Denver, Colorado. When I moved to Colorado, I was stunned by the snow. I remember staring out my living room window, wondering how I was supposed to drive in that stuff! I now walk and drive in it--but skiing? I don't think so. I love this part of the world, the magnificent Rockies looming to the west, the desert to the southwest. My family's roots are in Las Cruces, New Mexico, which is a 14-hour drive through the high prairie of southern Colorado, the mountains of Taos, then finally the Oregon Mountains and Mesilla Valley of Las Cruces.

When in Las Cruces, visit Day's Hamburgers, started by my grandmother (rumor says with a pound of hamburger meat and a dozen buns) during the Great Depression in 1932. It's still in my family, over 70 years later, being run by my cousin Donna Jean. Drop by and tell Donna I sent you!

Day's Hamburgers
725 N Main
Las Cruces, NM 88001
505.523.8665